Complaint against Thackeray: Police files ATR

New Delhi, Sept 22: The Delhi police today told a court here that it faces several legal hurdles in lodging an FIR against Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray for allegedly branding Bihar natives in Mumbai as infiltrators.

The police told Metropolitan Magistrate Neeraj Gaur that neither the comments were made in the national capital nor the newspapers which carried them are printed here.

The investigating officer, who filed an action-taken-report on a complaint for registration of an FIR against Thackeray for allegedly making remarks against Bihar natives, however, said the police was ready and willing to abide by the court's direction on the issue.

"It is submitted that neither the office of Maharasthra Navnirman Sena is situated in the area of the police station Subzi Mandi nor any such statement has been made by Raj Thackeray from the area of this police station," it said.

The ATR was filed on a complaint made by advocate Prem Shankar Sharma who said Thackeray's remarks, also threatening Bihar natives to throw out of Maharashtra, are provocative and anti-national, for which an FIR must be lodged against him.

The police also told the court that the complainant had claimed to have read Thackeray's alleged remarks in several English and Hindi dailies but "neither the office nor the printing press of the newspapers in which the news was published due to which the complainant has been hurt is situated in the area of the police station."

The police also claimed that "the news causing hurt to the complainant has been printed in Noida and Sahibabad, Uttar Pradesh. Hence, the complaint has been forwarded to SSP Ghaziabad for necessary action at their end."